


The Clone Zone: One for the Angels

by crowleyshouseplant



Series: The Clone Zone [2]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Death, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-28
Updated: 2016-02-28
Packaged: 2018-05-23 15:54:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6121681
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crowleyshouseplant/pseuds/crowleyshouseplant
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Cut Lawquane's transport is attacked by the Separatists, he is visited by Death.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Clone Zone: One for the Angels

**Author's Note:**

> Another Twilight Zone inspired Clone War ficlet (I know, there's not a neat little twist; oh well). Please be advised there is death ideation in this fic.

After the battle of Geonosis, Cut found that his hands would not stop shaking and that he would break out in the cold sweats even though his companions complained bitterly about the heat.

They noticed his pallor and asked what was wrong. He said that nothing was wrong, that he was just a little ill.

And it wasn't a lie. He was ill with the thought of what he had done, of what he had seen. 

That they had been made for--for this.

He found it hard to breathe, so he took off his helmet, held its skull face in his hands.

That's when they were attacked because there was never any rest in war. They were thrown from their seats. Red alarm bells blared off. 

He jammed his helmet on his head, tried to hold his blaster steady in his hand. Another volley of turbo fire cut through their shields. Acrid smoke flooded the corridors.

A final blast hurled him off his feet, and he was knocked unconscious.

He was not sure how long he had been unconscious, only that he was surprised that when he found himself waking up; shouldn't he be dead? 

He could tell that they had been boarded. Right now separatist troops would be at their data terminals, attempting to slice information about the Republic--access codes, military data, anything at all they could use against them.

He should probably stop them, but he did not know how. He did not even want to get off the floor. He could hear blaster fire--not from the kind of weapons issued to the clones, but the kind the battle droids used. 

They were killing the survivors, level by level.

He should have stayed asleep. He didn't have long. 

He supposed that meant he was a coward. So be it--he was tired of being brave on someone's order. If anyone had asked, he would have told them he didn't want to be a part of this war. 

Still, he dragged himself to his feet, clutching the sleek sides of their ship for balance. His gaze strayed out the viewport, expecting the dark of space and instead, seeing sunlight. They had crashed onto a planet.

But there was still no way off the ship. He would die by the separatists on this ship whether it was in space or not.

He crawled away from the sound of the blaster fire, not sure what to do or where to go. Maybe he should just wait for his fate. It would be easier, perhaps.

But when he heard a groan, he turned aside, and saw one of his brothers trapped beneath some fallen debris. Struggling, he lifted the weight, throwing it aside, but he could already see that it was too late. There was too much blood. The way he breathed was wet and bubbly. 

He would be dead before the droids ever found him.

"Don't leave," the man whispered, and Cut had nowhere else to be and so he stayed.

He held the man's hand so that the man would know he was still there when his eyes shuttered closed. 

The clones did not have a romanticized idea of death. Death was something that came for them all, quicker for the clones than for most, he thought. Even if they did survive the war, they would age too quickly, more quickly than any human. 

Their lives had been made to be short and convenient.

He squeezed the man's hand, feeling his throat well and thicken. 

"He is almost ready," someone said behind him. 

Cut started, still holding onto his fellow trooper's hand. There was a woman behind him. Her hair was dark and her skin as brown as his. She was dressed in robes that reminded him of the kind the Jedi wore, when they were not on the battlefield. Robes of simple cloth, probably rough and uncomfortable to the touch. Robes that swept the ground. Robes that hid their faces when they had the hoods pulled up.

But this woman did not hide her face.

Cut could clearly see the kindness in her eyes.

She stood beside him, over him. Her hand rested on his shoulder and he was surprised by the warmth of it. 

"It is good that he does not die alone."

He looked up at her then. He knew she was not really a jedi. She had no lightsaber for one thing. "Is that who you are, then? Are you death?"

"I suppose I am," she said, very simply. 

"You don't look how I would have imagined death if I had realized Death would be a person." 

"I am not a person, but I wear a visage that would be most familiar to you, and most appropriate."

Relief flooded through him. It was almost over. "I'm ready."

She smiled at him--beautiful and sad--as she cupped his cheek in her hand. "I've not come for you."

Death tilted her head to their fallen comrade, to the man whose hand he still held. 

The tears spilled over his eyes now. He couldn't help it. 

"Can't you trade? My life for his?"

"It doesn't work like that." 

She kneeled then, in front of him, so that their eyes were of a level. She caught one of his tears with her thumb. 

"I suppose I'm the only one who hasn't tried to bargain with you, tried to come back later?" He hid his eyes, ashamed.

"No," she said. "Many people call for me."

"Then why won't you take me? Two souls at once--what a bargain." 

"Because it is not your time." 

"I don't want to be their soldier!"

"And you won't," Death said. "You will not kill again, not unless you choose to do so. You will escape this freighter, and you will live, and one day, we will meet again." 

He wondered if he should believe her as her gaze turned from him to the fallen trooper. His grip was turning slack in his hand, and he knew that the end was near even before Death stretched out her hand and closed his eyes. 

Grief left him empty, left him hopeless. He was still on his knees. He still held his fellow soldier's lifeless hand in his. It wasn't fair. And there was nothing he could do to stop it, to stop all this. 

"Are you going to wait until the droids find you?" she said and she was standing over him once more. 

Cut dropped the trooper's hand, and leaned forward to check his heartbeat. It was slow. He wondered what had happened, wondered why Death would speak with him instead of assuring her passenger that all would be well, and that he should not be afraid of what was to come to pass.

And then he realized she probably had, that she could hold two conversations at once, because that is who she was: Death, and death was everywhere.

He scrambled to his feet and cast one final glance at his fallen brother. Goodbye, he thought. Goodbye.

Then she was behind him, and she pushed him gently forward. "Run, Cut. What are you waiting for?"

And so he ran straight ahead from a burning transport into a new life free from the war and free from the Republic's army.


End file.
